Houston may pay drowned boy's family $245,000

Family to receive drowning settlementCity Council must approve $245,000 award

CAROLYN FEIBEL, Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle |
August 6, 2008

Logan Jones, 13, drowned in a rain-swollen drainage culvert without bars in 2004.

The family of a 13-year-old who drowned in a Houston culvert four summers ago is set to receive a $245,000 legal settlement from the city.

The payment must be approved by the City Council, which will consider the settlement during the panel's weekly session today.

The family of Logan Jones sued the city after his death on June 25, 2004. Jones was playing in a rain-swollen ditch at Cimarron and Emporia, next to Cimarron Elementary School, in northeast Houston. The boy fell underwater and was sucked into a drainage culvert that ran beneath the street.

There were no bars to block the culvert's entrance, though some culverts do have them. Jones' body was found nearly two blocks away.

A Harris County jury awarded more than $2.5 million at a trial in 2006. But the city was granted a request for a new trial after a juror said she had been intimidated by the foreman, according to Senior Assistant City Attorney Jaqueline Leguizamón.The plaintiffs later agreed to settle rather than begin a new trial.

Soon after the accident, city officials said that bars are installed across drainage pipe openings upon request. There were no requests on record for the culvert where Jones died.

Requests for information about the city's policies for drainage culverts went unanswered Tuesday, as many "non-essential" city employees stayed home because of Tropical Storm Edouard.